


Hide and Seek

by seungsols



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Gen, Light Angst, Social Experiments
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-20
Updated: 2015-11-20
Packaged: 2018-05-02 12:37:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5248511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seungsols/pseuds/seungsols
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thirteen boys better be ready because if not, they may never see each other again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hide and Seek

He sat in the chair. Waiting. Hands flinching, unable to be controlled by him, as if they had their own mind.

Looking around, the room was sleek and clean, stainless, nothing out of place, everything displayed in either white or metallic silver. It made him want to vomit. He could have sworn he was going to pass out, but his body never gave in. From the turn of events, he just wanted to forget _everything_. Once he heard that door open, he wished his body was weak enough to do so.

He watched the director sit in front of him, khakis rising as she sat down with his clipboard. Pushing her glasses up, she crossed her legs and examined her papers before glancing up at the shaking, timid boy in front of her. She sighed as she took her glasses off, folding it and putting it in her lab coat pocket.

“Well,” she coughed. “Thank you for participating.”

The boy looked at her, emotionless as his head was raging with emotions. Anger, sadness, anxiousness, agony, everything negative and nothing positive. He furrowed his eyebrows as he opened his voice and weakly spoke. “T-thank you? After all that?” He managed to ball his hands into a fist. “T-thank you?”

She wrote down her observations of the boy before clicking her pen and setting it back down. “Yes. Thank you very much. Boo Seungkwan.”

–

“Hyung,” Chan whined as he nudged Seungcheol who was sitting in front of him gripping onto the steering wheel, “are we there yet? I really need to use the bathroom!”

Wonwoo rolled his eyes and looked behind before hitting Chan’s head, making the younger one yelp and pout as he rubbed the new bump behind his ear. “I told you to go before we went on the van!”

“Oh, relax!” Mingyu laughed as he patted Wonwoo’s back. “He’s just really excited.” Chan nodded as he sniffled and leaned his head against Hansol’s shoulder. Hansol laughed, petting the youngest’s head.

“He’s almost excited as me!” Hansol snickered as he looked out the window, gazing in amazement at the sight of an endless line of trees and various mileage signs. “I can’t believe they responded to my email!”

“Well, I don’t think they can ignore an email from a kid who basically sent a whole essay as to why they should accept them into the science program they offer to high schoolers,” Seokmin snickered.

“Especially if that kid is president of Science Honour Society, Science Club, Astronomy Club, and won first place in their category in the high school science fair when they were in eighth grade,” Soonyoung added on, high-fiving Seokmin as they saw Hansol blush with a small smile on his face.

Seungkwan laughed at Hansol’s reaction. “Oh, relax! We’re all excited and happy for you, okay?” Everyone nodded in agreement.

Minghao smiled at the sigh of everyone talking and chatting, excited for the adventure that awaits them. He kept taking videos and pictures oh his phone, snapping every moment so he can cherish them and show his family when they came back later that evening.

Seungcheol rolled his eyes. “We should have gone in separate cars though… who’s idea was it to take a thirteen seater van for a two hour drive?”

Everyone turned their head to Jisoo and Jeonghan who were sitting together in the way back, leaning on each other, sharing a set of earphones that were plugged into Jisoo’s phone. The long-haired one looked up and caught everyone’s gaze before elbowing Jisoo.

Jisoo looked up and sighed. “Are you talking about the van thing again? I thought it would be a good bonding experience for us…”

“A good bonding experirence? Do you know how much gas this fucking vehicle uses?” He glared at his friends in the rearview mirror. “You two are paying for the gas when we go back home and I have to pump at a station!”

“Us two?” Jeonghan waved his hands in denial. “I had no agreement to this!”

“Yeah,” Junhui coughed as he turned to look behind him, “but you, Jisoo hyung and Seungcheol hyung are the only ones with a job. So you guys are the only ones who  _can_  pay for gas.”

The guys laughed at Junhui’s smart alec comment, making Jeonghan blush and slapping Jisoo’s face as he leaned on his shoulder and they started listening to their music again.

Jihoon was passed out, leaning his head on the window of the van until they hit a bump that made him bang his head on the glass and he slowly peeled his eyes open, only to glare at Seungcheol when he came into contact with him through the mirror. “Drive more carefully,” he mumbled.

His hyung gulped and nodded before turning his eyes back onto the road.

The road stretched on, nothing but trees, grass, and the sky above accompanying them. The road was a two-way, but nobody came towards them in the opposite lane. Sun provided light to see the path clearly, but nothing seemed to be in front of them except for the asphalt. Even the horizon showed no signs of the science facilty Hansol was talking about.

It took approximately two hours, an hour and forty-nine minutes according to Hansol, before they reached a heavily gated facility.

“I-is this the place?” Chan gulped as he looked out the window, shutting his eyes seeing masked people in white uniform, holding guns that Seungcheol identified ones that were best used for headshots.

It was terrifying, seeing how one of the masked was at the gate entrance and questioned Seungcheol who needed to roll the back window down for Hansol to explain and identify himself as the student who contacted the director through his email.

After parking where the employees signaled them to go, the thirteen boys filtered out and looked around the place. Heavily guarded with more masks, guns firmly held in their hands, looking down at the young students.

Chan gulped and clung to Seungcheol who was looking around next to him. The older looked down and patted the younger one’s head. “It’s okay,” he whispered, ruffling Chan’s hair, “we’re in this together.”

The others nervously followed Hansol as he adjusted his glasses and looked around with amazement and a twinkle in his eye. “This is so cool! Every thing is so clean cut!” Seungkwan looked around and nodded, it was pretty nice how spotless the facility was.

As they waited waited inside just a few meters outside of the entrance door, Wonwoo nudged Soonyoung beside him, pointing at the older woman who slowly walked down the spiral staircase, sliding her hand on the railing as she smiled at the boys.

“Welcome, Choi Hansol and friends,” she smiled as she reached the bottom stair and walked to the boys. She placed her hands in front of her, bowing to the boys as they coughed and bowed at Seungcheol’s order to be polite.

Hansol moved up and scratched his nose before individually bowing. “I’m Hansol,” he introduced. He offered a hand which the director firmly shook. “Nice to officially meet you.”

“Oh, please,” she chuckled as she covered her mouth and took her hand back, “the pleasure is all mine.”

She lead them around the facility, telling about past projects and experiments they did in the past years, passing by various plaques and certificates down each hallway.

One of her subordinates accompanied her to the floor upstairs as they loaded the elevator before she tapped Hansol to stay behind. “You were the one who wanted to be an intern, right?” She smiled as the young boy nodded enthusiastically. “I thought so,” she motioned him to follow her down a separate hallway, one he swore he didn’t see when the first walked down the main corridor.

After inputting a pin code into the touch screen to the last door on the right, it opened, revealing a blank, white room. Nothing was there but a chair. Hansol looked up at her confused as he adjusted his glasses, making sure he wasn’t imagining just seeing one object.

“Please, sit,” she gestured. Hansol nodded, sitting down in the chair.

He put his backpack next to him, which was soon taken by two masked employees who took it out of the room silently, not turning back, door closing behind them.

Soon, it was just Hansol and the director. “Like everything so far?”

“Yes! Very much!” Hansol answered. “A-Are you still deciding if I can work here as an intern?” he stuttered, twirling his fingers, anxiously waiting for a response.

“Oh, I already decided to accept you. We want you working as soon as possible,” she smiled as she walked to the left, pressing her hand against the wall to reveal a large computer monitor filling the whole left side. Displayed on the screen were a few equations, some formulas that Hansol recognized.

“So..” he coughed, when do I start?”

“Right now,” she beamed as she turned around to face him. She opened up a tab, displaying a photo of a philosopher with various notes written around him. “Recognize him?”

“Socrates,” Hansol answered as he turned his chair to look at the screen in front view. 

“Very good,” she changed to another slide, listing various points and facts about the ancient philosopher. She walked from the monitor and  and towards Hansol. “Socrates was known for being a man of many words, always arguing.” She walked behind Hansol and let his hands graze across the back of the chair. “He claimed to know nothing, making him the wisest man in Athens.”

Hansol blinked, looking at the director as she walked back to the monitor, about-facing to him. “How does knowing nothing make him wise?”

She snickered, covering her mouth. “Pardon me.” She adjusted herself. “He said he knew nothing, knowing that there was much more to life and thinking than what he saw in his life. He kept arguing with others, until they admitted they knew nothing.” she walked back to the monitor. “Seems like he wouldn’t be that popular huh?”

The boy in his seat stood up and nodded, curiously.

“He wasn’t that well liked.” She change the slide to the next. “One thing he did was question people’s morals, to the point where they may change their views in different circumstances.” She looked at Hansol, a serious face displayed. “That’s where you come in. Care to take part in an experiment?” Hansol gulped as she walked right in front of him, tilting his chin up to face her. “A social experiment?”

–

Hansol couldn’t remember what happened after that. It was a blur, seeing a few masked people surround him. Before he knew it, he opened his eyes, surprised to feel his cheek on something cold. The floor. He slowly sat up and scratched his head.

White. That’s the colour that surrounded him yet again. This time, he saw Chan a few feet away, lying on the floor as well. He stood up and ran to his younger friend, seeing that he was unconscious. “Chan!” he shouted, shaking him. “Chan! Chan! Get up!”

It wasn’t long before Chan blinked and peeled his eyes open. “H-Hyung?” He sat up in front of the older and stretched his arms. “Hyung? What happened?” he rubbed his eye. “We were learning about some philosopher and then.. they surrounded us..”

“Chan? Hansol?” a familiar voice called out. The two looked over to see Soonyoung run up to them. He hugged the younger two and sighed in relief. “Oh, thank goodness you two are safe.” He pulled back and caressed their cheeks before inspecting the area. “It seems like nobody else is here.”

The three stood up and looked all around them, seeing nothing. Were they in a room? Were they in space? Nobody knew.

Soonyoung grabbed their hands, standing in the middle, and tugged at them. “We aren’t going to figure anything out just standing here.” And the three began to walk.

Whether the three were walking north or south, left or right, or straight or in a circle, was not to their knowledge. They just kept going. Surprisingly, they managed to find their other friends along the way. Each one, not remembering what had happened, but sharing the same blurred memory before waking up.

It wasn’t long before the thirteen boys were united once more. They all sat together in a circle, discussing the turn of events that had happened. There was a strange and unfamiliar atmosphere that surrounded them.

Soon, the white place began to turn into green, showing the ground underneath them. Chan touched it, pulling out a blade of grass, something that wasn’t previously there. The sky was coloured blue, trees and various other plants sprouted out.

The whole scenery was displayed. A forest, that’s where the boys were. By the looks of it, it looked like the outskirts of the facility they were once in. Or were rather still in.

“Morning boys,” the director spoke, nowhere in sight. The boys looked around them, terrified that she was hiding from them. “I’m not there. I’m speaking through the ring on your fingers.

“Ring?” Wonwoo mouthed as he looked at the guys. They all looked down at their right hand, seeing a metallic ring around their pinkies. Seungcheol tapped his and held it to his ear, listening to the director speaking loud and clear.

“Thank you for participating in the experiment you guys,” the director continued. “I will reward you as I promised after everything is completed.”

“Experiment?” Minghao gulped.

“Reward?” Jeonghan repeated.

“Completed?” Hansol gasped in surprise. “Ms. Director? You said something about Socrates last time I remembered..”

“Ah, yes. Very good Hansol. I knew I chose the right one as an intern.”

“Intern?” Seungkwan’s eyes widened as he looked at his best friend. “You already got a j-job here?” his voice rose.

“Easy now, Seungkwan,” the director chuckled. “I’ll keep this short and sweet since adolescent boys seem to lose their attention faster than anyone else.” She cleared her throat. “You all must know how to play hide and seek, right?” The boys couldn’t see her anywhere but she had a Cheshire cat grin. “Hide, make sure you don’t get found by the killer, and don’t lose. Simple. Just win.”

“Are there other ways to lose?” Jisoo gulped before letting go of Jeonghan’s arm and takes a deep breath. “H-how do you lose the game?”

“I’m glad you asked, Jisoo.” There was a long pause before further instructions. “Jisoo, come to the front.” He looked at his friends and sighed as he stepped forward. “Take off the ring,” she instructed.

Jisoo looked down at his hand and at the ring. Without another word, he took it off. Silence filled the air until Jisoo grabbed the back of his neck and started wheezing loudly before turning to his friends. He tried to reach his hand out for them but his body fell to the floor, eyes still open, mouth gaping wide.

Jisoo!” Jeonghan cried out as he ran over to his same age friend. Tears streamed down his shocked face as everyone else looked in surprise, realizing that one of their friend’s had just died. “What did you do to him?” he yelled up into the atmosphere, holding his dead friend in his arms.

“Just one of a few things that can happen to you,” the director replied. “If that ring ever comes off of your finger, the implant in your neck will close up your air passages and you’ll die of suffocation.”

“S-suffocation?” Chan whimpered as another tear fell down his cheek. Seungcheol held the younger one close and he angrily looked up, turning his head around, looking for something around them. 

“This is cruel!” Seungcheol yelled angrily, still crying at the turn of events.

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that, Seungcheol,” the director commented. “This is, after all, just  an experiment.”

“You killed our friend!” Hansol screamed. “This isn’t what I had in mind!”

“But Hansol,” she continued, “you said you would do anything for science. Remember The email? Are you changing your views after you told me them? That would be lying to me. Socrates wouldn’t be a fan of that.”

“Socrates isn’t here! And I value my morals more than what I would do for science.” He looked down at Jisoo as Jeonghan knelt in front of him, head down. “I want out!”

“Oh, I’m afraid the only way out is to win the game, Hansol.”

The boys all looked at each other and Seungcheol gave a confirming nod as they all stood by each other. “We’re in this together,” the eldest said.

–

The rest of the ways you can die were explained and deemed easy by the director.

Any attempts to escape would lead into one of the masked employees they previously saw when they first entered the building shooting them down. Communicating with anyone not in the field before the experiment comes to a conclusion results in getting escorted out and being injected with potassium chloride, commonly used in death row sentences. Anything else results in reactivating the implant in their necks and suffocation.

However, there was one rule that struck all of them: killing each other was allowed. In fact, the director encouraged it, saying that the experiment will go a lot faster as subjects start getting eliminated.

“We’ll never go down to that level, right?” Seungcheol asked the guys as he tossed more firewood into the campfire. The ten remaining boys looked at each other and nodded, vowing to not kill each other. 

Chan continued to stay by Seungcheol’s side that night as the three boys laid near each other, no sleeping bags, pillows, or blankets, just each other’s presence. “How long are we going to stay here hyung?” he whispered to Seungcheol.

Seungcheol brushed Chan’s bangs out of his face. “I’m not so sure… but we’ll make it out, okay?” There was a continuous murmur of softly spoken words before it was dead silent in the night, the campfire still burning smoke into the nighttime sky.

And just as the sun was rising over the horizon, there was a loud scream, waking everybody up.

The scream turned into whimpering and soft crying. Wonwoo’s eyes were half open as he rubbed them to see a sobbing Chan curled up with his knees tucked into his chest. He crawled over and patted the younger’s back. “What’s wrong Chan? Did you have a bad dream?”

“Bad dream?” he sniffled as he looked at his hyung. “More like I woke up to a bad reality.” He pointed to to Seungcheol lying next to him, stomach on the floor, arms and legs sprawled across the grass, knife stuck into his back.

Wonwoo’s eyes widened as he rushed over to look at Seungcheol, seeing his eyes were still closed as if he were still sleeping. He looked over at the night, blood everywhere on Seungcheol’s shirt. “Shit!” He tried to slap his face awake. “Hyung! Wake up! Fuck, hyung this isn’t funny wake up!” A tear fell from his eye as his slaps grew as weak as his voice. “Hyung… please…”

The other members began to wake up to a silent Chan and Wonwoo as they sat next to Seungcheol’s corpse.

Mourning their eldest friend’s death, Jihoon softly sung a sorrowful ballad song, one of Seungcheol’s favourites as the others threw flowers they found nearby onto the body, as if they were giving him a proper burial.

After saying their last goodbyes, they headed in a different direction.

“Who killed him?” Chan asked, looking up at his older friends.

“Now, Chan,” Jeonghan began, “we can’t assume one of us killed him.”

“But he couldn’t have killed himself! He looked like he was sleeping when he was killed!”

“Maybe the director killed hyung? Or one of the masked people?” Seokmin suggested, trying to ease the youngest’s heart.

They continued walking, trying to get their minds off of the death even though they couldn’t when they passed along a stream.

Hansol blinked. “I thought we were in a simulator field or something..” and he looked over to the water and adjusted his glasses. “But this water looks real.” His hands brush against the currents as he splashes his face. “Oh, it’s real!”

Junhui looked down and let the stream flow between his fingers and he watched it, his expression calming down. “Ah, it feels nice..”

The other boys joined in and their minds were preoccupied once again. Soonyoung took the chance and slipped off his shoes and socks and stepped into the stream with rolled up jeans. Minghao and Chan joined in on the fun.

Jeonghan ran some water through his hair and sighed in content, the water cooled his scalp down from the sun beating down on them.

Hansol and Seungkwan began to splash everyone near them, creating a huge water fight between the ten of them.

It wasn’t long before they all laid down at the edge, kicking their feet in the water and trying to dry themselves off.

“That was fun!” Mingyu commented as he smiled at his friends, all agreeing at that well needed water break.

Minghao was drawing circles in the water with his pointer until he saw a drop of red flow by. Strange, he thought. He ignored it until he saw a pair of two thin lines of red. Pretty soon, the red liquid was mixed with the stream evenly, causing him to scream. “What is this?”

Everyone turned their heads and their eyes widened, as they saw the whole stream turned a bloody red. 

Seeing as nobody else was willing to do so, Jeonghan stood up and swallowed the lump in his throat, walking up the stream to follow the trail of maroon. the younger ones followed behind their hyung. Minghao was right behind the long-haired one, each of them anxious, looking to see that everyone was here.

“Wait,” Seokmin breathed unevenly. “W-where’s Junhui?”

The question was answered with the screeching yell that came out of Minghao’s mouth. Everyone peaked over to see their friend from Shenzhen at the edge, upper-half fully emerged in the water and head spilling out the blood that they found earlier.

Jihoon and Mingyu quickly reached over and pulled Junhui out of the water, laying his body in the grass as they all surrounded him. Minghao pushed them aside and knelt in front of Junhui, blood streaming down his mouth. He turned over and looked at Minghao.

“Hyung! Hyung!” Minghao cried as he caressed Junhui’s cheek.

“The water feels really nice…” Junhui smiled as his eyes blinked slowly, almost squinting at the younger one.

“Hyung!” Minghao wiped the blood from his older friend’s chin. “Ge!”

Junhui still had that weak smile on his face as he patted Minghao’s arm. “Really nice…” His arm fell as his head tilted downward, blood still dripping from his mouth.

“Hyung! Junhui Ge!” The younger one held his older friend in his arms, softly crying as tears dripped onto the corpse before he lifted his head up, eyes shut, tears flowing, crying aloud to the heavens.

The other eight looked at each other in shock, walking up to Minghao to comfort him and try to make him stop crying.

Chan looked down at his deceased friend before grabbing his hair and pulling it. “I can’t do this! I can’t take this anymore!”

Seungkwan looked back at Chan who seemed to be having a panic attack. “Chan? Chan!”

“Hyung, I can’t do this anymore!” he barked, tightly gripping onto Seungkwan’s arms and shaking him a bit. “I can’t keep watching our friends die like this for some stupid science experiment!” He pushed Seungkwan away and looked down at the ring on his finger and gulped.

The others looked at Chan, begging him not to do it as they saw the way he looked at the ring.

He took a deep breath and gave them a small smile. “I know I don’t say this often, but I’m really thankful for all of you guys.” They stood silently, unable to move as they sadly watched their younger friend. “Maybe one day,” he sniffled, “we’ll be able to be with each other again.” His other hand took off the ring and tossed it into the stream.

His body fell seconds later, but he didn’t show sighs of choking like Jisoo did. The older ones placed Chan and Junhui’s bodies next to each other, seeing that at least they had each other as they continued walking along.

They walked into a forest, trees standing and stretching for miles. The sunlight barely crept through the branches of the trees, so the dimly lit path forced the boys to grab onto each other’s hands. Jeonghan was at the back, being the eldest, and Hansol, the youngest, up front.

It was a nice walk, in fact it was just as calming as the stream they had passed by a few hours ago. Jeonghan was the first to initiate a conversation between them, trying to make his younger friends feel a bit better, and it worked.

For the most part, they felt at ease, thankful that they at least still have each other.

“Seems like you all are enjoying your walk,” the director chuckled as the boys stopped in their tracks.

Jeonghan rolled his eyes and scoffed. “It’s the least we can do after four of our friends died!”

“Oh, that’s just survival of the fittest, Jeonghan,” she replied.

“Fuck science!” he screamed. “This means nothing if our friends are dying left and right!”

“Left and right you say? I think we should change it then. I’d watch your back if I were you, Yoon Jeonghan.” There was a moment of silence before there was a cracking noise.

“D-do you hear something?” Mingyu gulped The noise continued to grow before all of their eyes shot back behind Jeonghan’s head, tree’s falling down the line, blocking the path going back.

“Shit, it’s catching up to us!” Jeonghan hissed He looked at his terrified younger friends and began to push them. “Don’t just stand there! Run!”

The younger seven began to run as fast as their legs could take them. Thankful for his long legs, Mingyu surpassed his friends and exited the forest the quickest, Jihoon rode on his back, realizing he didn’t have the energy to run. Minghao and Soonyoung followed behind, their endurance built up from the dance club the two are a part of at school. Hansol and Seungkwan were gripping tightly onto Wonwoo’s hands as they escaped the falling trees.

Jeonghan and Seokmin were running right next to each other before Seokmin tripped over a tree branch. Jeonghan looked back and saw how the falling trees were approaching. “Dammit!”

“Hyung go on without me!”

“Seokmin stand up! Hurry!” He reached over and grabbed his friend’s hand to help him up and pulled him before throwing him over his shoulder and sprinting. Those weekend gym sessions with Seungcheol truly paid off.

Seokmin lifted his head, realizing how close the trees were coming to them. “Hyung, we aren’t going to make it!”

Jeonghan ignoreis younger friend’s words. “ _We_  may not, but _you_  will!” and he pulls Seokmin by his waist and throws him off of him as the threes come crashing down above him.

Mingyu catches Seokmin who turns around and trembles when he sees the last tree crash in front of them. “Jeonghan hyung!” he yelled, voice croaking as tears begin to stream down his face.

The tallest patted his back and carried him as Seokmin was too shocked to walk for himself. He continued to cradle him before he ended up crying himself to sleep.

Sky growing dark, sun setting, the boys began to settle down and gather firewood for the night ahead. They managed to survive last night from Junhui picking and pulling on berries and leaves he deemed edible for the boys to eat, which was much harder since Junhui wasn’t of assisstance any longer.

A few dandelions were nearby though, and Hansol learned in school that their leaves were edible, so that was their dinner for tonight. It wasn’t the best, nor was it the most appetizing, but they needed something to fend off of.

There was no reason to talk, fearing that their last words of the night would be the last words of their life. They sat there silently, keeping warm by the fire and sitting closely next to each other, vowing to not kill each other during the night. 

The next morning, they woke up to a surprise. Two, in fact.

Mingyu and Soonyoung, sandwiching Jihoon in between them, were both lying on the ground, necks slit, chests stabbed into, several times as they observed. Jihoon was the first to wake up to the horrific sight, waking the others up.

“It’s that damned director!” Wonwoo hissed through his teeth. “She thinks she can just toy with us like that!”

“Actually– judging by the marks– it doesn’t seem like the killer was a professional,” Hansol examined closely.

Wonwoo glared. “If it wasn’t for you in the first place, we wouldn’t be in this fucking mess!” He pulled Hansol closer to him by the collar of his shirt and glared at his younger friend who was shaking with wide eyes. “It’s your fault for dragging us into this!” He was about to throw a punch before Minghao grabbed his arm.

“Hyung…” Minghao softly spoke. Wonwoo was breathing heavily before he looked back at Hansol, seeing him grasp onto Wonwoo’s hand that held his collar and the terrified look on his face. He loosened his grip on Hansol and turned his back to him.

“Let’s just go,” Wonwoo sighed as he rubbed his neck and led the team.

Seungkwan went to help Hansol back up as his friend breathed heavily. The two walked behind the pack, walking to wherever life took them in this fucked up simulator.

“You know,” Seungkwan whispered to Hansol, “it’s interesting… Mingyu hyung and Soonyoung hyung were killed.. but Jihoon hyung wasn’t..” The two turned to each other with the same look in their eye. “You don’t think–”

“Jihoon hyung would never do that!”

“But the director said that people’s morals can change according to the circumstance.” The two gazed up at their short hyung from behind. “Remember that one time he threatened Mingyu hyung with a guitar?”

“He touched hyung’s instrument without permission,” Hansol added. “But there was that one time Soonyoung hyung _did_  push Jihoon hyung’s buttons to the point where hyung needed to leave the classroom in order to not cause a scene…”

The two shut their mouths when they saw Jihoon look back at them. Their hyung smiled at them, but they weren’t positively sure if that smile was sincere or mischievous.

The remaining six stopped underneath a tall oak tree, resting as they were weak against the heat that beat down on them.

“Seems like you boys are thirsty?” a high-registered voice spoke.

Wonwoo scoffed. “We can just go back to the stream we went by yesterday.”

“A nice thought, but a poor plan if you were to do so,” she snickered. “If you didn’t remember Wen Junhui, number three, tainted the water with his blood. That water is undrinkable now.”

Six of them looked at each other, confused, mouths dry from lack of hydration. Jihoon looked around, seeing no source of water anywhere. “Is there another stream nearby?”

“I’m afraid not,” she sighed, seeming to have sympathy for the poor boys. “I’ll tell you what, I’ll give all of you water bottles! I’ll send some of my workers down there to deliver it to you.” They cheered, hugging each other with wide grins plastered on their faces. “On one condition, however… I only have five bottles of water and it’ll be boring to just share, right? I need one person killed in order for the delivery to proceed.”

“Are you kidding me?” Wonwoo tugged on his hair as he waved his arms around. The director didn’t reply, making the eldest groan more in annoyance. “That woman is driving me crazy!” 

“Hyung?” Minghao tugged on Wonwoo’s damp and dirt-covered pant leg. “W-we aren’t actually going to kill each other, are we?”

Wonwoo looked down and crouched beside his younger friend and patted his back. “No, we aren’t. Just like Seungcheol hyung said, we’re going to stick together.”

And so they sat at the oak tree. Feeling themselves grow weak, unable to settle their sore throats or quench their thirst.

The next turn of events happened within a few minutes. Minghao and Jihoon were with each other before Jihoon hit the back of his neck, feeling something. The next thing he knew he was straddling Minghao underneath him, the younger one begging for mercy and the older not knowing what was happening to his body, as if he were being controlled.

Jihoon got off of the corpse, hands shaking as he looked at them before back at the body. He fell back onto the ground, he clutched his shirt, gasping for air, unable to process what had just happened. His heart beating faster than usual, his body shaking as he lied down in the grass in shock and paranoia.

Seungkwan and Hansol were leaning on Seokmin’s shoulders dozing off when a worker tapped them and passed them water bottles.

They were each given two due to what had just happened. When asked where Wonwoo had gone off to, the worker replied saying that he ran but they chased him down and took care of him.

The three held hands, scared of losing one another, as if they would never see each other again. Camping out with what little firewood they could savage, the three stayed snugged up next to each other, that way nobody could ever possibly kill them without the others knowing.

Unfortunately, their plan wasn’t much of a success, seeing that Seokmin was killed and his arms were precisely sliced off as his chest was stabbed into, directly piercing his heart.

The two ninty-eighters only had each other now, not knowing the possible outcome of their end.

As the walked along, hand in hand, trying their best not to turn back to look at their deceased friend, they heard a slow clap.

“Well done, boys!” the director cheered. They both rolled their eyes as the clapping died down. “Seems as though you two aren’t as cheerful as I expected.”

“Shut up!” Hansol finally let out. Even Seungkwan was surprised by his friend’s words. He never told people off like that. “We’re sick of your games! Making us kill our friends!”

“Oh, I didn’t do it,” she responded. “You all took it upon yourselves to change your morals due to the–”

“–circumstances, MY ASS!” Hansol heaved out. Seungkwan stared at his friend, a bit terrified, never seeing this side of him.

“Oh, Hansol, I wouldn’t say that. You were, in fact, the one with the highest streak.”

Seungkwan felt his heart sink. Streak? What streak? He let go of Hansol’s hand as he had wide eyes, looking at his face in terror.

“S-seungkwan.. I have no idea what she’s talking about?”

“You don’t do you?” she asked. “Well, I wouldn’t think you would since that extra implant we put in you makes you forget your killings.”

Weakly, Seungkwan’s legs wobbled as he fell to his knees, looking at Hansol, shaking his head in denial. “N-no, Hansol! It can’t be true!”

“I don’t know what she’s talking about!” Hansol grunted.

“Careful, Hansol. We wouldn’t want you to trigger your anger and end up killing seungkwan as well…”

“Seungkwan, you have to believe me,” he pleaded as he went on his knees, clasping his hands together in front of his friends, “I didn’t kill any of our friends…”

“Hansol, you aren’t fooling anyone,” the director continued. “In fact, I’ll show you what happened every night as you killed your four friends.”

Suddenly, the sky changed from a light, soft blue to a dark, royal purple. A projection was displayed in the sky. Both Hansol and Seungkwan looked up and watched in horror.

The first night, Hansol was clearly seen stabbing Seungcheol in the back multiple times before slamming the knife into the back and going back to his resting spot. The second night he was shown holding two swords, thin and crisp, as he carefully cut up Mingyu and Soonyoung. The third night showed him slice Seokmin’s arms off before jabbing the chest.

As the sky turned back into daytime, Seungkwan’s mouth was quivering, speechless. He turned to his best friend who looked down at his own hands.

“I’m a monster,” Hansol kept mumbling to himself. He looked up at Seungkwan and his eyes began to water. I’m a monster!” 

Seungkwan was going to grab Hansol’s hand before Hansol fell to his bottom and scooted back 

“S-stay back! I don’t want to hurt you either!” Without a second thought, Seungkwan pulled Hansol towards him 

“I know that wasn’t you though,” he huffed. I know they’re just controlling you.”

“How do you know that?” Hansol whimpered as his eyes grew more watery, blurring his vision. “You saw it right there! I killed our friends! Me!” He ruffled his hair in anger before gripping onto Seungkwan’s shoulder. “You’re my best friend… I.. I don’t want to hurt you…” 

Before Seungkwan could say a word, Hansol pulled him in for a hug. A tight hug, something that the two rarely share, only given during occasions of great joy or great sorrow. Seungkwan believed this was the latter of the two, even though he kept denying it. He hugged back, sharing a few seconds of silence with each other before Hansol weakly pulled back.

Seungkwan sensed that Hansol didn’t want to but felt the need to. Hansol mad a run for it, running away from his friend, not turning back. As much as Seungkwan wanted to call out and tell his friend to stay with him, he couldn’t.

He curled up in a ball and cried himself to sleep that night, realizing he was truly all alone once he heard a familiar voice scream into the night followed by silence. 

It wasn’t until the next day, or rather when he opened his eyes, that he saw himself in a white room. The same white room that he was originally in with his eleven other friends on their tour of the strange science facility, Hansol being dragged into a room by himself.

“Congratulations Seungkwan,” the director smiled as she entered the room, seeing the weak boy slowly get up from the ground and sit up. “You’re the survivor of the game.”

“G-game?” Seungkwan repeated, voice weak with a hoarse.

“You’ll get your reward in the mail after we send you home, okay,” she smiled, patted his back before helping him stand up and walked out of the room shutting the door behind her.

He was escorted by three of her workers rwith masks, all congradulating him on a job well done. While, yes, he was the said winner, he felt much more like a loser.

This had to be all a dream, right? There was no way that he just lose all of his friends within the span of four days.

According to the workers, however, the boys had been in the facility for only half of the day. Seungkwan was astonished, there was no wait that all just happened within a day.

Before he exited the building, the workers turned him around, the young boy speechless as a white light was blinded him. Once collecting his vision, the director stood in front of him. “Hello, Seungkwan!”

The boy blinked and looked around. “Uh, hello?” He scratched his head and looked around. “Where am I?”

“I was just escorting you out on your way back to the bus,” she smiled. He turned around, outside a bus waiting outside for him, honking it’s horn. “Your mother called me while you went to the bathroom, saying you need to get home as soon as possible.”

“Oh,” he coughed as he put his hands in his pockets. “Yeah… she tends to do that…” he blushed. 

The director gave him a warm smile and patted his head. “Wouldn’t want her to worry now, huh?” She opened the door for him. “Hurry back safely, okay? You can come back again!” He nodded, walking out the door and looking around, the white walls that shielded the facility, the building, sleek and clean. The only thing that seemed out of place was the silver tinted van that was parked near the side of the entrance gate. Seemed familiar, but he brushed the thought off

He blinked before smiling. “Okay!” He wave to the director as he walked to the bus. “I’ll be sure to bring my friends next time too!” he beamed as he leaned back on the sat of the bus, closing his eyes happily. Excited to tell his friends about the crazy dream he just had.


End file.
